The biggest lesson Altiner says he has learned is to use reference before starting to assemble a matte painting. “Matte paintings require photo-realism, and seamless integration with a particular scene you work with,” he says. “This is achieved by integrating photos and/or CG elements, and blending them together. While creating this type of work, you will most of the time freehand paint on top of certain areas to add textures, and other real-life fundamentals. This will vary upon each project.” The only time he got to entirely freehand paint certain things was for the film ‘Van Helsing' where I purely used his painting skill for a couple of matte paintings to add certain parts of the environments.

The work and expectations will become more complex with a lot more VFX shots, unique camera moves and new ways of solving problems. More filmmakers will take advantage of shooting on green-screen stages and use cost effective solutions such as miniatures and matte paintings. The matte paintings in the future will become more integrated with the newer and creative 3D tools to give even more freedom to directors to limitlessly move around these environments. Employment ads will appear in the near future with companies looking for 3D matte painters with extensive 3D technical skills, experience, and art direction, as well as painting skills, since many CG programs will have more complex, but exciting ways of creating virtual worlds.

Besides working as a matte painter, Alp Altiner has also been working as a 3D artist on various projects for film, television, commercials and music videos. He also recently got into character modeling, and study 3D intensively. Alp Altiner considers himself a VFX artist specializing both in 2D and 3D matte paintings, as well as 3D modeling, texturing, lighting, and rendering. His goal is to continue to grow and learn as an artist in general, and learn more about filmmaking and the creation of visual development in motion.

d’artiste: Matte Painting
Alp Altiner is an author of d'artiste: Matte Painting, the authoritative guide to digital matte painting written by leading Hollywood artists. d'artiste: Matte Painting is now available to purchase directly from Ballistic Publishing. More